Trouble over Telangana: 6 ministers boycott cabinet meeting

As many as six ministers hailing from Telangana region abstained from the crucial Andhra Pradesh Cabinet meeting here today.

The six ministers stayed back in New Delhi and chose to skip the cabinet meeting even as four other Telangana ministers, who also went to national capital yesterday to meet Union Ministers and senior congress leaders on the statehood issue, returned this morning just in time for the cabinet meet.

This was the first time that so many ministers abstained from the cabinet meeting for reasons other than official, government sources said.

Though the cabinet meeting schedule was fixed more than a week ago the Telangana ministers preferred to join their other colleagues in New Delhi and lobby the statehood case.

Senior ministers K Jana Reddy, Ponnala Lakshmaiah, Komati Reddi Venkat Reddy, D Sridhar Babu, P Sudhershan Reddy and Basuraj Saraiah were absent at the cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy. Ministers D K Aruna, V Sunitha Lakshma Reddy, R Venkat Reddy and P Shanker Rao air-dashed from New Delhi this morning and attended the cabinet meeting.

Meanwhile, minister Kanna Laxminarayana could not attend the meeting as he was on a trip abroad.